Moving Towards a Trauma-Free Society

What if you were given the opportunity to erase a memory, especially, one you're not fond of? As humans face traumatic events every day, whether it be war, rape, domestic violence, disturbing memories are formed, making them more susceptible to mental illness and social disability. In order to compensate for traumatic memories, researchers have started to consider the positives of memory modification. Specifically, patients with post-traumatic stress disorder have become a priority in regards to memory treatment. Various techniques have been considered, including drug treatments, classical conditioning and epigenetics.

According to a recent study, researchers found they were able to modify memories of fear in mice through classical conditioning. Electrical foot shocks paired with an innocuous stimuli, such as a tone, were administered to the mice. Following this treatment, exposure to only the tone elicited a fear response, freezing, in the mice. During exposure therapy, often given to PTSD patients, the tone was repeatedly played without the foot shock. As the fear response became extinct, mice learned to associate the tone with a safe environment, modifying their initial memory of the tone.

In order to reinstate plasticity in the brain, needed to rearrange neural connections involved in memory consolidation, researchers have considered the epigenetics route. Epigenetic signals have been proven to regulate processes from memory formation and addiction to plasticity. Because remote memories are cemented due to epigenetic STOP signals over plasticity genes, researchers designed a technique to inhibit STOP signals. Introducing the epigenetic modifier agent, CI-994, enzymes involved in the removal of GO signals were inhibited. Thus, not only did this increase the susceptibility of distant fear memories to attenuation, but it allowed for the possibility of adapting negative memories into positive memories.

In a presentation created by Joe Vukov, a philosophy professor at Loyola University Chicago, the use of the prescription drug propanolol was introduced as an effective treatment for negative memories in PTSD patients. In several studies that he reported, control groups, those receiving a placebo, and experimental groups, those receiving the beta-blocker drugs, were presented with fear-inducing stimuli, whether it be the reading of an emotional narrative or fear-conditioning. In conclusion, researchers found that propanolol not only blocks initial consolidation of emotional memories but the reconsolidation of emotional memories as well.

As a takeaway from these studies, various memory modification treatments are not only possible but may be beneficial to PTSD patients and anybody affected by serious traumatic events in general. Although we are still in the early stages of memory modification research, as there are various ethical decisions to be made, it will be exciting and interesting to see how new research moves towards a society less affected by trauma.

 References:

Birey, Fikri. "Memories Can Be Edited." Scientific American. N.p., 08 May 2014. Web. 09 Dec. 2016. <https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/memories-can-be-edited/>. 

Enduring Questions and the Ethics of Memory Modification: Presentation by Joe Vukov, PhD

Liao, S. M., Sandberg, A. (2008). The normativity of memory modification. Neuroethics, 1(2), 85-99. doi: 10.1007/s12152-008-9009-5

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https://futurism.com/videos/implications-memory-modification-technology/